Friday Favorites - Life Lately

It's Friday - but this week my favorites are going to be a little different. I wanted to play a little bit of catch up with all the things that have been going on in the last few weeks. I have been in and out of blogging land (it feels like to me) and so I wanted to do a little photo dump and share quite a few of my faves! 

When we returned from vacation on Wednesday evening, I had the joy of knowing I was off on Thursday and Friday as well. We mostly poked around at the house on Thursday and just had a bit of a lazy day - Ryan came over for dinner and we played some games afterward. Friday was especially wonderful for me because we took Lindsey to Ryan and I's new hometown and showed her our home and some of the places we are coming to love in our little town! And y'all - look at our rose bush!

 

After we showed Lindsey around our house, we had lunch together at Woodstock Café and then popped into The Buttercup across the street! The Buttercup (as I think I've already mentioned) is the cutest little boutique; it has really cute clothes and excellent prices! I will definitely be supporting this small business - it's great! We decided to pop into Flour and Water Co. for our desserts: a slice of Key Lime Pie, a Cruffin filled with Strawberry Rhubarb Cream, Tiramisu and a Lemon Tart - all were divine!

 

 

Watson was well and truly spoiled with Lindsey being in town - she is always a sympathetic ear to his little cries for a bite, ha-ha! He sampled cupcakes and a slice of peanut butter and jelly pie but what he did NOT sample were the Fortnum & Mason Jubilee chocolate truffles. Sorry bud - your vet would probably have a fit if she knew you were getting pie and cupcake... but chocolate is always a no.

I will say - as the little fella gets older, I am a bit more lenient with what treats I'll offer him. You only live once, so as long as I know it's not dangerous to him (like chocolate) - I'll give him a wee bite.

 

 

Is it wild that I can't remember a whole lot about Saturday from two weeks ago? Probably not, huh? I know we had breakfast at the house and just bummed around a bit - and then I snuck Lindsey off to do a little shopping before bringing her home to a little surprise get together to celebrate her graduating with her Master's from Liberty! Way to go Beast!

Sunday after church, we couldn't resist wearing our matching dresses! I purchased the orange blossom print dress from Draper James about two months ago and lo and behold - when Lindsey got to VA, she'd purchased the same print in a different style! So we felt we had to wear them to brunch at Regions and we all had a laugh about it! Growing up, my Mom always tried to match us and here we were - 37 and 31, wearing matching dresses to brunch! A photo shoot followed brunch, of course!

And then - the work week began again and let me tell you, it was a rough week. Not kind of rough or a little rough, it was just rough! I was glad to see Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday pass and was thrilled to head to Ryan and I's little home after work on Thursday and spend some time on some trails near our house with Ryan. The weekend arrived in the nick of time and I was thrilled to see 5:00 on Friday!

Saturday was a wonderful day - I was able to sleep in for a bit and then Ryan and I joined my parents to see Top Gun: Maverick in IMAX! The movie was incredible and we all thoroughly enjoyed it! Once we returned to my parent's house, Ryan crashed ahead of an overnight shift and I freshened up and headed to meet my friend Katie at The Vine & Leaf in Front Royal! The Vine & Leaf has a wall of loose leaf teas, another wall filled with Virginia Wines and a display case filled with fudge and chocolate - it is the best little spot to catch up! 

Sunday was church and tackling a mountain of thank you notes that I wanted to finish before the week and extra day off got started. I started the fourth season of Stranger Things while I wrote my thank you cards and enjoyed managing to get some things done while also relaxing. And it was so nice to not have to get up until around 8 AM on Monday!

Ryan worked all night on Sunday night but he was determined that we were finally going to conquer the hike around Lake Frederick on Memorial Day, so I made us some hash browns and sausage for breakfast before we put on our hiking boots, sprayed on the sunscreen and bug spray and headed out into the wilderness! The hike was really beautiful and it was amazing to watch the forest change as we cruised along... we started at mile 7.5 and around the lake we went... mile 7, mile 6.5, mile 6, mile 5.5, mile 5... and then we stopped for a bite of lunch!

 

After our lunch stop, we got back at it but my hiking boots had only been worn once or twice and they were starting to rub my heels. *sigh* I ended up feeling a blister pop on my left heel and I had to tell Ryan we needed to find an alternate route off the trail. Luckily he's smart and used his phone to find a way to exit the trail early and walk us out into the neighborhood - since my heel was bothering me, he sat me under a tree in the shade with water and walked to the house to get the car and come pick me up! He is absolutely a knight in shining armor... or sweaty hiking clothes - it's all the same.

We both ended up taking naps after our 5 mile hike and I finished up the last of the thank you cards before we had pork ribs and corn for dinner... and then went to Newtown Creamery for our dessert! Don't let Ryan's face fool you - he ate all of his ice cream!

I leave you with a snapshot of Watson, myself and a giant frog that hopped up to us in the backyard on Wednesday night. I would say this week has been smoother - and it has - but Watson is under the weather and his age is really showing this week. May into June has been a wild few days and I'm glad the weekend is almost here! Y'all enjoy!